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Impact Wrestling
Impact Wrestling is a privately held American professional wrestling promotion founded by Jeff and Jerry Jarrett in 2002. It is the second-largest professional wrestling promotion in the United States after WWE, and is controlled as a subsidiary of the New York and Toronto-based integrated media organization Anthem Sports & Entertainment. The promotion was initially known as NWA: Total Nonstop Action (NWA:TNA) and was associated with the National Wrestling Alliance (NWA). It withdrew from the NWA in 2004 and became known as Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA), but it continued to use the NWA World Heavyweight and the NWA World Tag Team championships as part of an agreement. After the agreement ended in 2007, the company created its own TNA World Heavyweight and TNA World Tag Team championships. It is the only major American promotion to predominantly make use of a six-sided wrestling ring up until January 2018. Championships Current champions Sanctioned Unsanctioned Other accomplishments History Formation The concept of TNA originated shortly after World Championship Wrestling (WCW) ended in 2001. Bob Ryder, Jeff Jarrett and Jerry Jarrett went on a fishing trip and contemplated their futures in the professional wrestling business. Only one wrestling product remained on United States national television: the World Wrestling Federation (WWF, later WWE). Ryder felt that this situation led many television stations to regard professional wrestling as bad for business, so he suggested a company not reliant on television, but rather one going straight to pay-per-view. The Jarretts found the financial backing they needed and the company put on its first show on June 19, 2002. That night, however, in a dark match just before they went on the air, a 450 lb wrestler named Cheex hit the ropes with so much force that one of them broke. The estimated repair time was 30–60 minutes, which they did not have because the schedule called for them to go live in a few minutes, whether the ring was ready or not. Backstage, the producers shuffled the schedule so that some non-wrestling segments went first to give the ring crew some more time, but they did not have many of them. The ring crew fixed the rope with the help of Ron and Don Harris, and everyone went live hoping for the best. Initially, TNA's weekly pay-per-view show operated as the company's main source of revenue, in place of monthly pay-per-view events used by other promotions. These shows took place mostly at the Tennessee State Fairground Sports Arena in Nashville, Tennessee, nicknamed the "TNA Asylum". After 27 months and 111 pay-per-view events, TNA began holding a weekly television show and monthly three-hour pay-per-views. The last weekly pay-per-view took place on September 8, 2004. Xplosion launched on November 27, 2002 as TNA's first regular cable show and featured exclusive matches from the TNA Asylum as well as exclusive interviews with TNA wrestlers. On November 18, 2004, the show became a recap show of the previous week's Impact! in light of alterations in the taping schedule. Xplosion resumed airing exclusive matches (billed as "Xplosion Xclusives") once more on October 7, 2005 in addition to recapping Impact!. The "Xplosion Xclusives" also aired on the now-ceased TNA Global Impact! internet show. Airing of Xplosion in the United States ceased at the end of 2006, although some of the exclusive matches can be seen on TNA Today. 2004–2010 In May 2004, TNA introduced a television program, Impact! (stylized as iMPACT!), produced at Soundstage 21 at Universal Studios Florida and broadcast on Fox Sports. The transition included the use of a six-sided wrestling ring, the implementation of the "Fox Box" displaying competitors and timekeeping for the match and a generally more sports-like style than the sports entertainment style exemplified by WWE. With the switch to cable television, TNA discontinued their weekly pay-per-view shows in favor of a monthly 3-hour pay-per-view format as previously used by WCW and Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW) and as currently used by WWE. In November 2004, TNA held the first of these pay-per-views, Victory Road, beginning the pattern of pay-per-view shows that continued until 2013. The television contract with Fox Sports expired in May 2005 and was not renegotiated, leaving TNA without television exposure. This prompted TNA to air Impact! via webcasts – originally made available via BitTorrent and eventually via RealPlayer – and on Urban America Television replacing Xplosion. During this time, TNA continued pursuing a profitable television deal for regular broadcasting, would later secured a deal with Spike TV and aired its first episode on October 1, 2005. In October 2006, TNA began holding select pay-per-views outside of its central filming location, the Impact Zone in Orlando, Florida, with Bound for Glory. In April 2006, TNA began a partnership with YouTube, under which TNA supplied YouTube with exclusive video-content in exchange for hosting, leading to the production of internet shows. In January 2007, TNA's mobile-content deal with New Motion, Inc. led to the introduction of TNA Mobile and mobile fan-voting. TNA has also launched "TNA U TV"; podcasts aired through YouTube to help promote the company. Impact! expanded to a two-hour format on October 4, 2007. On June 21, 2009, TNA launched an online video-vault subscription-service where subscribers could watch past pay-per-views by choosing one of three payment options. On October 23, 2008, TNA made the transition to HD and since then all programming has been broadcast in high-definition. In addition, TNA introduced a new HD set that included new lighting and several large high-resolution screens. 2010–2014 In 2010, TNA hired professional wrestling legend Hulk Hogan and former WCW President Eric Bischoff. Both obtained a position behind the screen (Bischoff was part of creative and Hogan a consultant) and made some changes. They also hired many high-profile former WWE wrestlers, including Ric Flair, Rob Van Dam, Mr. Anderson and Jeff Hardy, while returning to a four sided ring. On February 15, TNA made a new deal with Spike TV, which [[TNA Impact!'s move to Monday nights|moved Impact! to Monday nights]], directly opposite of Raw (although the network kept the Thursday night slot open for repeats of the Monday night shows). The first episode took place on March 8. On May 3, TNA moved Impact! back to Thursday nights, re-branded as "TNA Thursdays". At the same time, Spike also picked up TNA Reaction (stylized as TNA ReAction or, alternatively, as TNA ReACTION), which became a regular one-hour docu-series on June 24. ReAction focused on the stories and characters of TNA and previewed the upcoming episode of Impact!. On February 24, 2011, TNA began holding Impact! tapings at the Crown Coliseum in Fayetteville, North Carolina. On May 3, Impact! was re-branded Impact Wrestling. On November 7, TNA revealed that Ohio Valley Wrestling (OVW) would become TNA's official developmental territory. In December 2011, TNA debuted their new India-based subsidiary promotion Ring Ka King. On May 31, 2012, Impact Wrestling began airing live at a new start time of 8 p.m. EST on Thursday nights. The live schedule would continue throughout 2012. On July 11, DirecTV, the carrier of Spike, blocked all Viacom stations affecting TNA viewership from DirecTV subscribers. After DirectTV and Viacom reached agreement, the removed channels were added back on July 20. In March 2013, TNA began taping Impact from different venues around the United States and terminated its lease with Universal Studios. On March 14, TNA introduced a new universal HD stage which would be used for all weekly programming. On November 2, TNA ended its relationship with OVW. TNA formed a relationship with Japanese promotion Wrestle-1 beginning in July 2013 with a meeting between TNA founder Jeff Jarrett and Wrestle-1 head Keiji Mutoh. It was arranged for Jarrett to wrestle for W-1 in October 2013. In November, A.J. Styles successfully defended the TNA World Heavyweight Championship at a Wrestle—1 show in Japan. From the period of 2013 to 2014, many well-known names or veterans of the company left TNA. Hulk Hogan's contract with TNA expired in October 2013 and he returned to WWE in early 2014. In December 2013, A.J. Styles left TNA after his contract expired. Styles later said that he could not accept TNA's new contract offer which would see him take a 60% cut in pay. Also in December 2013, TNA founder Jeff Jarrett "resigned" from the company. TNA accepted his resignation but clarified that Jarrett was still an "investor" in TNA. In spite of his investor status, the following year Jarrett revealed plans to start a new professional wrestling promotion, Global Force Wrestling. The departures did not stop in 2014, with TNA veterans Sting, Chris Sabin, Hernandez, Christopher Daniels and Kazarian all leaving the company in that year, and the contracts of TNA Hall of Famers Bully Ray and Devon reportedly expired in October 2014, with TNA moving them to the alumni section of their roster in January 2015. In late July, the TMZ website reported that Spike TV was not renewing Impact Wrestling beyond October. In response, TNA refuted the report, stating that negotiations were still ongoing. On August 14, TNA moved Impact Wrestling from its Thursday timeslot to Wednesday nights. On August 20, TNA signed an extension with Spike TV until the end of 2014. The 2014 Bound for Glory pay-per-view was held in collaboration with Wrestle-1 in Tokyo, Japan on October 12; the TNA World Heavyweight and the TNA World Tag Team titles were not defended at the event, which featured TNA wrestlers James Storm and The Great Sanada against Wrestle-1's The Great Muta and Tajiri in the main event. After Bound for Glory, TNA effectively went into hiatus due to Impact Wrestling ending their contract with Spike TV and its subsequent move to Destination America. The show ceased airing new televised events after the November 19 episode of Impact Wrestling, with the final episodes of 2014 being dedicated to Best of TNA clip shows, before resuming events on January 7, 2015 with a live show from The Manhattan Center's Grand Ballroom in New York City. 2015–2016 As revealed in November 2014, TNA ended its relationship with Spike and instead partnered with Discovery Communications to distribute its programming beginning in January 2015. In the United States, TNA programs, including Impact Wrestling, moved to Destination America. Discovery also held rights in selected international markets. Spike's outreach at the time was estimated to be more than 97 million homes while Destination America was estimated to reach 59 million households. However, Destination America was one of the fastest growing cable networks. Impact Wrestling premiered on Destination America on Wednesday, January 7 at 9:00 p.m. TNA also started two new shows: Impact Wrestling: Unlocked, hosted by Mike Tenay, and TNA Wrestling's Greatest Matches, a series presenting the best matches in the company's history. From December 2014 to March 2015, several employees re-signed with TNA, including Kurt Angle, Jeff Hardy, Gail Kim, Mr. Anderson, Abyss and Matt Hardy. Awesome Kong also re-joined the company following several years of absence. During this period, veteran Samoa Joe and commentator Tazz left the company by mutual consent. On April 27, 2015, Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan joined TNA as senior producer of creative and talent development. Destination America gained over 41.94 million viewers over the course of 2015's first quarter, making this the channel's best first quarter ever, followed by their best May ever in prime time. In both cases, Discovery Communications touted Impact Wrestling as one of the reasons for the increase in viewers. Despite this success, Discovery Communications dropped Unlocked and Greatest Matches from their programming in May 2015. On November 19, TNA signed a deal with Pop to air Impact Wrestling, where it premiered on Tuesday, January 5, 2016 in a live special held at the Sands Hotel and Casino in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. With this move to Pop, Impact Wrestling introduced a new HD set, graphics and theme music. This show saw the semi-finals and finals of the TNA World Title Series, which was won by Ethan Carter III. Husband and wife team Mike Bennett and Maria Kanellis would debut soon after. Subsequent shows would include episodes taped during a tour of England, which would be the last TNA appearances for Kurt Angle. TNA began taping Impact Wrestling from the Impact Zone at Universal Studios in Orlando, Florida beginning with a live Impact Wrestling on March 15. On March 19, longtime TNA wrestlers Eric Young and Bobby Roode left the promotion after 12 years. On April 22, Velvet Sky, another longtime TNA wrestler, left the company. On August 12, Billy Corgan became the promotion's new President, while Dixie Carter became Chairwoman and Chief Strategy Officer. On October 13, Corgan sued TNA due to an unpaid debt which Corgan claimed TNA has defaulted on. The state of Tennessee has also put a lien on TNA for unpaid taxes. Fight Network has since offered to help TNA and repay Corgan for the loans, while also offering additional financial assistance to TNA to help keep them from filing for bankruptcy. On October 31, Corgan lost his injunction that kept TNA from selling the company, but TNA was required to pay Corgan back by November 1. It was possible that one of the other minority owners could pay Corgan, effectively making them the majority owner of TNA. On November 3, the company revealed that Anthem Sports & Entertainment provided a credit facility to fund operations for TNA and that Corgan was no longer with the company as President. However, Corgan himself stated that neither TNA nor Anthem Sports & Entertainment has yet repaid the $2.7 million debt that was owed to him by TNA and, as such, he was considering suing, as well as converting the debt into a 36% stake. As the result of a settlement between Corgan and TNA, Anthem Sports & Entertainment had acquired the loans Corgan made to Dixie. 2017-present In January 2017, CBS Corporation, which owns the Pop cable channel, joined Hulu's new live stream service to broadcast TNA. Anthem Sports & Entertainment purchased an 85% majority stake of TNA, re-incorporating TNA's parent company. Dixie Carter retained a 5% minority stake in the company, but resigned as Chairwoman after fourteen years with the company and joined Fight Media Group's advisory board. The promotions's parent company, TNA Entertainment, was changed firstly to Impact Ventures and then to Anthem Wrestling Exhibitions, LLC., with Anthem's Executive Vice President Ed Nordholm becoming President of the new parent company. On January 5, Jeff Jarrett was brought back by Anthem to serve as a consultant. On March 2, all appearances of the name TNA were dropped from the TV tapings. At the same tapings, Bruce Prichard stated that the name was "dead", with Anthem re-branding the promotion as Impact Wrestling, the name of its primary television platform. During that day's broadcast, Jeremy Borash stated the same. Former programming Initially, TNA's weekly pay-per-view show operated as the company's main source of revenue, in place of monthly pay-per-view events used by other promotions. These shows started on June 19, 2002 and were held mostly at the TNA Asylum in Nashville, Tennessee. After 27 months and 111 PPVs, TNA felt that they had enough of a fanbase to begin holding a weekly television show and monthly three-hour pay-per-views. The last weekly PPV was held on September 8, 2004. TNA Xplosion was launched on November 27, 2002 as TNA's first regular cable show and featured exclusive matches from the TNA Asylum as well as exclusive interviews with TNA Superstars. On November 18, 2004, the show became a recap show of the previous week's Impact! in light of alterations in the taping schedule. However, Xplosion resumed airing exclusive matches (billed as "Xplosion Xclusives") once more on October 7, 2005 in addition to recapping Impact!. The "Xplosion Xclusives" also aired on the now-ceased TNA Global Impact! internet show. Airing of Xplosion in the United States ceased at the end of 2006 although some of the exclusive matches can be seen on TNA Today. Programming Impact Wrestling is the current flagship show for TNA Wrestling TNA began airing TNA Impact! (officially typeset "TNA iMPACT!" and often referred to as "TNA Thursdays") on June 4, 2004 on Fox Sports Net. After TNA's contract with Fox Sports Net was not renewed the following year, TNA was forced to broadcast Impact! from their official website, while seeking a new television outlet. TNA later secured a deal with Spike TV and aired its first episode on October 1, 2005. Impact! expanded to a two-hour format on October 4, 2007. On February 15, 2010, TNA made a new deal with Spike TV which moved Impact! to Monday nights. The first episode took place March 8, 2010. In December 2009, Dixie Carter announced in an interview that TNA Epics, which had recently aired its first season exclusively in the United Kingdom, would be debuting in the United States in January 2010. The second season began on Thursday, January 14, 2010. TNA Epics showcased matches and events from the history of TNA Wrestling, much like WWE Vintage Collection does for WWE. The show was hosted by Mick Foley, and aired on one Thursday each month on Spike, until April 2010. On April 12, 2010, TNA Wrestling aired a pilot episode of their new show TNA Reaction, which is a documentary-style show that presents an exclusive behind-the-scenes look at the stars of TNA speaking about taking on their rivals. On May 3, 2010, TNA announced that TNA Impact! will be moved back to Thursday nights re-branded as "TNA Thursdays". At the same time the company also announced that Spike had picked up Reaction, which would start airing weekly prior to each episode of Impact!, starting June 24. The premiere date for Reaction was later changed to July 15, when it would start airing after Impact! instead of before it. However, in late June Reaction was pulled from Spike's schedule. On August 3, 2010, TNA announced that Reaction would premiere on August 12 and air every Thursday following Impact! on 11pm ET/10C. Also in June, TNA revamped Xplosion, still airing on international markets, making it more of an original program instead of a highlight show. TNA Impact! is currently the highest rated and most watched show on Spike TV. On May 3, 2011, TNA Impact! was re-branded Impact Wrestling. All Wheels Wrestling taping on 6/29 at Impact Wrestling Zone will be a pilot taping, and a potential series in 2012, for the Speed Network. TNA is involved with the taping since they purchased the trademark and the domain name for the property. No word yet on what talents will be involved or how the concept of the series will merge racing and wrestling. Impact Wrestling currently airs content all day every day on their Twitch.tv channel including live events and Impact Wrestling episodes. Impact Wrestling also has a streaming service called IMPACT Plus. It gives users access to all past events, pay per views and Impact Wrestling episodes while also airing live events. Impact Wrestling Hall of Fame The TNA Hall of Fame was announced on May 31, 2012. The first inductee was revealed to be Sting on June 10 at Slammiversary. Sting's official induction ceremony took place at Bound For Glory. Kurt Angle became the second inductee to the Hall of Fame in 2013. In 2014 Team 3-D were announced as the third inductees. House shows and touring Apart from their weekly shows in Universal Studios, TNA started running house shows on March 17, 2006. In August 2007, live-events coordinator Craig Jenkins stated that TNA intended to stage eight pay-per-views and 96 house shows outside Orlando, Florida in 2008. In 2008 TNA conducted its first tour of the UK, with most shows selling out. 2009 saw the promotion first touring Germany. On July 2, 2010, MCU Park hosted a live Total Nonstop Action Wrestling house show, which also has broke TNA attendance record and is currently the most attended live TNA house show in the US with an almost capacity crowd of 5,550 TNA fans. Features Ring shape and locations Different from other United States professional wrestling promotions, Impact Wrestling utilized a hexagonal ring as opposed to the traditional square ring. In 2018, it returned to using a four-sided ring. X Division Since its origin, Impact Wrestling has featured a high-flying, high risk style of wrestling called its X Division. Rather than emphasizing the fact that most wrestlers who perform this style are under 220 lb (100 kg) by calling it a cruiserweight division, Impact Wrestling decided to emphasize the high risk nature of the moves that these wrestlers perform. There is no upper weight limit on the X Division or its title, though in practice, most of the wrestlers in this division have been cruiserweights, with Samoa Joe, billed at 280 pounds, and Kurt Angle, billed at 230 pounds, being notable exceptions. To further emphasize this point, the slogan "It's not about weight limits, it's about no limits" is used to describe the division. Although it was de-emphasized throughout 2007, the X Division is generally regarded as one of the key attractions of Impact Wrestling and was replicated in several independent promotions. Ranking system On April 26, 2010, Eric Bischoff appeared on Impact! to unveil the TNA Championship ranking system. According to Bischoff, the system combines several factors to determine the #1 contender for the TNA Heavyweight Championship. These factors include the overall performance and achievements throughout a wrestler's career, the TNA win/loss record of the wrestler, and online voting by the fans, which takes place on the promotion's website. It was also announced that a "TNA Championship Committee" had been set up to make the final decision based on these factors. The committee currently consists of TNA President Dixie Carter, Hulk Hogan, and Bischoff himself. The ten wrestlers chosen to appear on the first ballot were Kurt Angle, Jeff Hardy, Mr. Anderson, D'Angelo Dinero, Sting, Jeff Jarrett, Abyss, Rob Terry, Desmond Wolfe, and A.J. Styles. The first round of voting ended on May 3 and was won by Desmond Wolfe, who received his title shot that night on Impact! against Rob Van Dam. The second round started that same night. New names included in the new poll are Matt Morgan, Brother Ray, Brother Devon, Rhino and Hernandez. The first Top 10 ranking was revealed on May 20, with Sting claiming the number one spot. On the second Top 10 ranking Abyss, Jeff Hardy, and Mr. Anderson were tied for the top three spots. A month later Abyss claimed the top spot., TNA was in talks with Indy Hardcore wrestler Jesse james sr, But TNA was unable to meet with the demands of Jesse James sr, neither partie had comment on this matter. Partnerships International Throughout its history, Impact Wrestling has worked with several international wrestling promotions, with championships from those promotions sometimes having been defended at Impact Wrestling events. Among the organizations Impact Wrestling has worked with are Mexico's Consejo Mundial de Lucha Libre (CMLL), Japan's Inoki Genome Federation (IGF), New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW), Wrestle-1 (W-1) and America's Evolve. TNA's relationship with NJPW lasted from 2008 to 2011, and included TNA sending wrestlers to participate in NJPW's annual Wrestle Kingdom event, as well as NJPW sending future IWGP Heavyweight Champion Kazuchika Okada on a training excursion to TNA; however, the relationship soured in 2011, when IWGP Tag Team Champions Team 3D were held off of a New Japan tour in favor of appearing on Impact Wrestling and Okada was given a Green Hornet-inspired gimmick while being cast as Samoa Joe's sidekick. On March 2, 2014, TNA collaborated with Wrestle-1 in producing the Kaisen: Outbreak supershow in Tokyo, Japan where three TNA championships were defended. In May 2015, it was reported that the relationship between TNA and Wrestle-1 had ended. Impact Wrestling currently has a working agreement with the Mexican promotion Asistencia Asesoría y Administración (AAA) & the Japanese promotion Pro Wrestling Noah. On March 24, 2017 it was announced that Impact Wrestling has formed a partnership with television station ITV in the United Kingdom to bring World of Sport Wrestling back on the air in the UK, after a thirty-year hiatus. In early 2018, Impact ended it's working relationship with The Crash promotion of Mexico when Konnan, the intermediary between the two promotions, left The Crash. National Impact Wrestling has also worked with American independent promotions in various collaborative efforts, such as Global Force Wrestling (also founded by Jeff Jarrett) and OMEGA Championship Wrestling (owned by Matt Hardy, Jeff Hardy and Gregory Helms). Personnel Creative team Vince Russo had served as head booker of TNA until May 2010, with the collaboration of Hulk Hogan and Eric Bischoff. Former bookers, whether temporary or semi-permanent, include Jeff Jarrett, Jerry Jarrett, Jeremy Borash, Mike Tenay, Abyss, Dutch Mantell and Ed Ferrara. At times, the position of booker has been coterminous with the on-screen position of Director of Authority. Authority figures When TNA first launched, it billed the on-air authority figure as a representative appointed by the National Wrestling Alliance. It did this for storyline purposes only, however, and the actual "representatives" already worked in some capacity for TNA. From February 19, 2003, TNA had no active authority figure until July 23, 2003 when Erik Watts made his return to TNA as the Director of Authority. Watts started feuding with Don Callis (TNA Management Consultant), ending with Watts forced to quit. On February 18, 2004, TNA named Vince Russo the new Director of Authority, a position he held until November 7, 2004 when Dusty Rhodes defeated and replaced him. The NWA Championship Committee, established in 2004, comprised a group of wrestling veterans who acted as arbitrators, determining a winner in the event of a time-limit draw. The committee consisted of Harley Race, Larry Zbyszko and Terry Funk, with Funk later replaced by Roddy Piper without ever having appeared on TNA television. After Race and Piper left TNA, the Committee essentially ceased to exist as a physical on-screen body, although Zbyszko continued to be referred to as a member of the committee while simultaneously acting as on-screen authority figure, booking matches and giving title shots. Impact Wrestling contracts Impact Wrestling wrestlers are forbidden by contract from working for WWE, but are free to work for any other independent wrestling promotion, domestic or international. Many Impact Wrestling wrestlers perform regularly for various promotions on the independent circuit in addition to Impact Wrestling's weekly shows. The majority of Impact Wrestling wrestlers are paid on a per appearance basis. Previous Logos TNA_2002_logo.jpg|(2002) TNA_Logo_2005.jpg|(2003-2010) TNA HD Logo.png|HD Logo (2008-2010) tna_logo.png|Alternate blue logo (2011–2017) Impact 2017 slider logo.jpg|Impact Wrestling Anthem first logo (2017–2018) Impact_Wrestling_logo.jpeg|(2017–2019) See also *Impact Wrestling/Roster *Impact Wrestling/Event history *List of Total Nonstop Action Wrestling albums *IMPACT Plus TNA on Tour *2011 Tour *2012 Tour *2013 Tour *2015 Tour *2016 Tour External links * Profile * Impactwrestling.com * Impact Wrestling Facebook page * Impact Wrestling Twitter page * Impact Wrestling YouTube channel * Impact Wrestling Twitch channel *TNA Figure Collection Database *TNA Title Histories ---- ---- ---- el:Impact Wrestling fr:Total Nonstop Action Wrestling ro:Total Nonstop Action Wrestling zh:TNA Category:American wrestling promotions Category:Total Nonstop Action Wrestling Category:Promotions Category:Total Nonstop Action Wrestling television programs *